GOD IS: The God Of All Creation
Last week we embarked on an exciting journey to know
and explore various aspects of our incredible and majestic God. My premise for
this new GOD IS.. series is the
fact that many of us at Hope Church believe and know the God of the Bible. His
name is Jesus. However, I attempt to clear up certain misconceptions about God
and strengthen the concepts you already know in the affirmative. The first step
in our journey is a step of faith.
We begin our discovery with a firm belief that God
exists and rewards those who earnestly seek Him. Hebrews 11:6, "And it is
impossible to please God without faith. Anyone who wants to come to him must
believe that God exists and that he rewards those who sincerely seek him."
Nothing displeases our God more than our unbelief and lack of trust in Him. With
that in the background, we will explore several attributes of our God. Today
will look at God as The God of all Creation. John 1:1-12
I.
In The Beginning, God:
Our Holy Bible begins in Genesis 1:1, "In the
Beginning God," and ends with the words of God in Rev. 22:21 to indicate
everything begins and ends in and with God. In the English Bible, the Greek Word
theos (God) appears 1317 times and kurios (Lord) 717 times.
The third commandment says, Exodus 20:7, "You
must not misuse the name of the Lord your God. The Lord will not let you go
unpunished if you misuse his name." Modern man has no regard for God.
People use the word "God, so flippantly and irreverently.
The ancient Israelites called God Adonai, which means
the Lord, My Great Lord. They took God as their master, majestic Lord; hence He
has total authority in their lives. The Word Adonai was pronounced in
substitution of YHWH because the Israelites considered that to be too sacred to
be uttered and to avoid the misuse of God's Holy name.
The Psalmist said, "O Lord, our Lord,
your majestic name fills the Earth! Your glory is higher than the heavens."
Psalm 8:1 Let's not misuse the Lord's mighty name. Proverbs 18:10, "The
name of the Lord is a strong fortress; the godly run to him and are safe."
Whether people show reverence to our God, are not we, as His Children, let's
respect, honor, and continue to walk in fear of that name of our God, who is also
the God of all Creation.
II.
How did God create our beautiful world?
Genesis 1:1, In the beginning,
God (Elohim) created the heavens and the Earth. (NLT), "In the
beginning, when God created the universe." (GNT). The Hebrew Word Elohim
means "The All-Powerful One; Creator of the Universe—the rest of the
chapter details how God went about creating the Universe and our beautiful Earth.
You may have heard this argument:
Does the Bible, Really Say That God
Created Everything in Six Days Just 6,000 Years Ago? There are at least
four views of the Genesis Creation account: 1. The literal/historical "young
earth," 2. The Day-age view, 3. Progressive
Creation 4. The Gap Theory. Which view should we believe? Most theologians and scholars
believe in the six-day creation narrative.
Genesis 1:3, "Then God said, "Let there be
light," and there was light. And God saw that the light was good. Then he
separated the light from the darkness. God called the light "day" and
the darkness "night." And evening passed, and morning came, marking
the first day."
The early Jewish authors understood the six days as
six ordinary days (not six long ages) because the Hebrew Word for a day (yom)
is qualified with "evening," "morning," and a number for
each of the six days in the Creation Week. When yom is used with any of
these qualifiers throughout Scripture, it always means an ordinary day. Where
else this six-day creation narrative was mentioned? When God wrote the ten
commandments with his hands, He established the six-day creation work week as
an eternal covenant between God and His people.
When God wrote the fourth commandment, He stated in Exodus
20:11, "For in six days the Lord made the heavens, the Earth, the sea, and
everything in them; but on the seventh day, he rested. That is why the Lord
blessed the Sabbath day and set it apart as holy." He made the fourth
commandment a permanent covenant between God and His people.
Exodus 31:16-17, "The people of Israel must keep
the Sabbath day by observing it from generation to generation. This is a
covenant obligation for all time. It is a permanent sign of my covenant with
the people of Israel. For six days, the Lord made heaven and Earth, but on the
seventh day, he stopped working and was refreshed." These scriptures
indicate that the world was created in six days. Let's see what else the
scriptures say about the God of all creation.
III.
The God of all creation
Think about this for a moment. All the flowers, beautiful
creatures, wild beasts on the land, vast schools of fish in the sea, the
rivers, snow-capped majestic mountains, Grand canyon type valleys, the Sun, the
Moon, and the galaxies steaming with stars in the Universe, how did they come
into existence? Do you know how many galaxies and stars are there?
"If we made the most straightforward estimate
using today's best technology, we'd state there are 170 billion galaxies in our
Universe. But we know more than that, and our modern estimate is even grander:
two trillion galaxies. Each galaxy contains at least 100 billion stars. You multiply them by
two trillion, and you will get the total amount of stars in the Universe.
When we look at this beautiful planet Earth with all
its intricacies and galaxies, how could anyone foolishly think all these came
into existence by just a BIG bang? There must be a powerful creator behind this
glorious creation. Who could that be? What is his name? How can we know Him? One
of the historical books of the Bible, Genesis, explains how this wonderful
world came about and who created it. It also speaks of its deterioration due to
the Fall of man.
Without a doubt, we know all these were created by
God, Genesis 1:16-17, "God made two great lights—the larger one to govern the
day, and the smaller one to govern the night. He also made the stars. God set
these lights in the sky to light the Earth, to govern the day and night, and to
separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good."
The Psalmist praised, "He counts the stars and
calls them all by name." Psalm 147: 4. Isaiah encourages us to "Look
up into the heavens. Who created all the stars? He brings them out like an
army, one after another, calling each by its name. Because of his great power
and incomparable strength, not a single one is missing." Isaiah 40:26.
Who is this God of all creation? Our passage for today
gives us His name. John 1:1-3, "In the beginning the Word already existed.
The Word was with God, and the Word was God. He existed in the beginning with
God. God created everything through him, and nothing was created except through
him." Who was the Word in these verses? It was Jesus, and He is our God.
Colossians 1:15-17 "Christ is the
visible image of the invisible God. He existed before anything was created and
is supreme over all creation, for through him, God created everything in the
heavenly realms and on Earth. He made the things we can see and the things we
can't see, such as thrones, kingdoms, rulers, and authorities in the unseen
world. Everything was created through him and for him. He existed before
anything else, and he holds all creation together."
Who is the most beautiful and outstanding in all of
God's creation? It is people, you and me. "God created human beings in his
own image. In the image of God, he created them; male and female, he created
them." Gen 1:27. What should be our response to God's beautiful creations
of the world and humanity? We admire and take good care of earthly resources.
Instead of resenting, we are grateful for God creating us wonderfully complex.
(Psalm 139:14). We love and serve all people regardless of who they are, as all
of us are made in God's image.
